


The Winds of Change

by tinx_r



Category: Richard Jury Mysteries
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2011-08-19
Updated: 2011-08-19
Packaged: 2017-10-22 20:04:27
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,252
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/242020
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/tinx_r/pseuds/tinx_r
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p><i>Richard changed after he was shot.</i></p>
            </blockquote>





	The Winds of Change

**Author's Note:**

  * For [RileyC](https://archiveofourown.org/users/RileyC/gifts).



Richard changed after he was shot. Melrose had watched with concern that grew exponentially. He understood, in a way: he knew his friend's fears, probably best of anyone alive. For if Richard confided in anyone, it was in he; poorly, and incompletely, but enough for Melrose to piece the thing together.

Richard was afraid, deathly afraid; this much was clear. From the beginning of their friendship, solitude had been something Richard actively sought out, needing it like another needed air to breathe, water to drink. Quiet times replenished the man, calmed his soul, brought him to Plant's hearth bubbly and hearty, good company and better friendship.

Melrose treasured those moments.

He was not so much for solitude, himself. A few select friends improved one's life, interaction fed the mind, cheered the heart. Kept Agatha on the far side of the door.

Best of all had always been Richard's sporadic and often lengthy visits to Ardry End; the two of them rubbing along with the ease of great familiarity. A partnership, a friendship.

A lifestyle choice.

For Melrose, at least. It had slowly been borne in upon him that charm Polly Praed never so sweetly, flick those violet eyes of hers his way; and however clever he found Bea; no woman held his interest like his friend Jury. No matter how sweet he found her, how warm the sheets, he could not tear his mind from his own fireside, and his dear friend seated in the opposite chair.

That held true even now, even changed as Jury was. The difficulty lay in Richard's whereabouts. He was rarely at Melrose's hearth, rarely even in Long Piddleton; more often to be found with a woman on his arm, dining her, bedding her, promenading her.

He wore these women like trophies, held almost at arm's length, as though he was uncertain how to handle such creatures; but with an air of gawky pride that caused a knife to twist deep in Melrose Plant's chest.

It was on a summer's afternoon when Melrose had not seen Jury nearly four months--once an unprecedented length of time, now a commonplace--that Melrose drove up to town. He did not announce his coming, merely booked a room at the Savoy, left his car and made his way to Islington.

The flat, when he came to it, was empty. But Carole-anne was at home, so Melrose had both access and company while he awaited the errant occupant. He walked the familiar room, letting his fingers touch Richard's surfaces, letting the conversation wash over him. This girl was somehow more in Richard's life than he, due only to an accident of proximity.

It wasn't fair. He looked at her with something akin to dislike--not for her, pretty butterfly, but for the pieces of Richard she took, when he would have jealously guarded each and every one.

"You miss him, don't you?" She stood up suddenly, head on one side. "You must."

Melrose stared. To answer in the affirmative was unthinkable, a Pandora's box not ready to be unleashed upon the unsuspecting flat. But denial was equally unthinkable.

Melrose was still struggling for an answer when the door to flat swung open, and Jury walked in. He was alone; he paused on the threshold and stripped off his coat. "I appear to be late," he said, in the quiet voice that made Melrose yearn for his companionship. "I apologise if I have kept you waiting." The note of irony in his voice was unmistakable.

Carole-anne began a scattershot relating of messages then segued into a request for company at The Angel. Melrose wondered for a moment if Jury would take the offered escape, but Richard looked merely amused, then exasperated, then at the last relieved when he finally closed the door on her.

"I must have forgotten you were coming," Richard said on a note of inquiry, turning before Melrose had had a chance to compose himself.

Melrose coughed in an attempt to hide his confusion. "A butterfly child." He paused, then went on as Jury kept looking at him. "Perhaps the message went astray."

"Perhaps. They sometimes do." A slightly rueful smile curved Richard's lips. "Butterflies are like that."

Melrose nodded, but he had an idea that Richard wasn't fooled. He stood, went to the window then turned back, gripping the back of a chair. "I wanted to see you. I thought perhaps we could go to dinner."

Richard lifted a shoulder. "I have an engagement," he said helplessly. "I'm sorry, Plant. How long are you in London?"

 _An engagement._ Melrose shuddered. Of course Jury had an engagement. If he had not, he would have graced Ardry End with his presence long since. "What's her name?" he asked hollowly.

"Sandra. It's--I met her at a market."

"Like Jane." Melrose's mouth was dry, his throat constricted. "Of course. Listen, forget it, Richard. I should go."

"Forget what?" Richard's expression narrowed, folding in on itself. "Plant..."

"Forget I ever came. Forget everything." Plant stared at Jury a moment then marched for the door, pausing only briefly to take up his coat from the rack. He stopped with his hand on the knob, and glanced at his friend. "And in answer to your question, I leave for Long Piddleton immediately."

"Plant, wait." The pleading note in Richard's voice stopped Melrose in his tracks, halfway out the door. He turned back slowly, sorrow heavy in his chest.

"I've waited long enough, Richard. I tried to help. But you wont let me, you don't want my help. You think you want Sandra, and when she leaves you, it'll be Susan, or Sarah, or Angela, or Jade. Someone you chose at random by virtue of her X-chromosome, or maybe the cut of her raincoat."

"It's not that I don't want your help." Richard sounded as though speaking hurt him. "I don't--I don't know who I am at the moment. My memories--my cousin--it doesn't make sense. What was in her papers isn't how it happened. I know I was with my mother when--" He stopped, shrugged. "Melrose, I'm--I don't think I've ever been the man you thought you knew."

Melrose's chest felt tight, as though there was hardly room for heart and lungs together. "You fool," he said quietly. "You have never been the man you think you are. This man you show your women, I have no time for him. I never did. The Richard I know, my friend, he's worth ten of him." Melrose swallowed a lump in his throat. "I miss my friend, Richard. And I can't wait forever to catch him--to catch _you_ \--between failed love affairs."

Jury rubbed a hand across his face. "I don't think you understand," he said tiredly.

"Of course I don't." Melrose stared at his old friend sadly. "How could I, when I haven't seen you in months? But I can guarantee Sandra doesn't understand either, and the difference, Richard, is that I care."

"I know you do." Richard rubbed his face again, then shrugged. "But I'm not sure you should, Plant. Even I don't, not anymore."

Melrose came back inside the flat and closed the door behind him. "That's why I came. Because I'll always care, God help me."

Richard swallowed hard. "Do you think," he said awkwardly, "that you care enough for both of us?"

Melrose Plant stared at Jury a long moment then crossed to his side and took his arm. "Yes," he said simply. "Yes, Richard, I do."


End file.
